Sombreuil

He was well on the way to recovery but by nationals he was suffering from the urachal remnant problem that put him in hospital immediately afterwards. That was my first season as a fan and it was an absolute rollercoaster.

We don’t know what contracts she or her team may have signed.

That must be incredibly frustrating

I’ve just been assuming that the prices won’t go down given that it’s in Sweden and I have relatives who live there and it’s expensive

I thought I might make my first trip to a competition in Stockholm but not at those prices on those terms - do they think we can’t read or comprehend the terms after the last year? As soon as I claw back a bit of cash from the ever open beaks of my children the ISU shifts the goalposts again and I have a rooted objection to daylight robbery. Maybe he will go to Grenoble though I’d prefer it if he didn’t risk the ice tbh.

If he ever decided to have a go at ice dance a la Takahashi, when he’s older Satoko would be a great partner - her lines are as lovely as his are.

It seems likely that they would involve him in some capacity if not the actual lighting - I think Kohei Uchimura is hoping to compete, so would be ineligible. Sawao Kato is a gymnast who won 12 medals at three olympics, 1968- 1972, 8 of them gold - I imagine he would be a contender and I’m sure there are other Japanese Olympic champions who would be in the running. I didn’t find it surprising that he took a low profile at PC - his ankle must have been killing him and the freezing air is really bad for asthma.

I think maybe it’s a touchstone for him - it must be so familiar that it might cheer him up when things aren’t going well and put him back into the winning groove. I love murderface Chopin from NHK 2015

It’s a good interview - a grown up interview, where most western interviewers, to my mind, try to infantilise him. The Pooh reference came across as a genuine inquiry as to what made Pooh the iconic image for him, a question which I would love to know the answer to but probably never will, rather than one of those belittling questions we so often hear. I wonder whether a Japanese interviewer will ever get that answer or whether it’s just a private thing he prefers to use the language barrier to defend.

It’s desperately sad - I couldn’t believe it when I saw it. I feel so sorry for his family, especially Cathy who has lost a work partner as well as a brother. I hope she can find the strength to pursue their joint vision.

This for me too - I was watching it on my iPad and got the strongest feeling that he was going to try it. The WTF skating doodle summed it up - it was like a storm over the horizon and then bam - he was going for it......

I hope he does Rostelecom - they’ve got Shoma as national champion, let him do NHK.

Aaaaah - too many difficult choices

It will be interesting to see what he does. The chances are he will have a long spell in which to work on whatever he wants at his leisure because probably a lot of ice shows will be cancelled as well while the world is shutting down to try and minimise the impact of the pandemic. Lots of time to work on 4A, choose new music, polish new choreography. Maybe finish his degree. Not sure he’s ever had this luxury of time before without injury or illness - I’m looking forward to seeing what he does with it.

I think we should all remain calm and remember that this is a bogus award: take the least important component of ‘value’ - monetary - that is totally in Yuzuru’s favour and anyone who doubts it can just tally up the take from his last season ( whenever that may happen) and the next. The important components, artistry, technical ability ( in all its facets not just jumps), sportsmanship, demonstrating a balance between the will to win and the acceptance of defeat etc etc I don’t need to argue for in this forum.

Brian seems to find an easier rapport with the sociable types who are probably more like he is himself in personality (JF). I don’t think this actually matters very much, since for the most part it doesn’t seem to cause a problem at the boards and the k&c and Yuzuru seems to get what he needs from it. I could do without what comes across to me as the repeated implied criticism of Yuzuru’s lifestyle- I have to do a lot of work related socialising which doesn’t come naturally to me and it really annoys me when the naturally sociable and outgoing get credit for having a ‘healthy’ attitude to life when for the most part it’s really just their personality type, not something they have somehow consciously decided to do. Tracy and Ghislain don’t seem to feel the need to talk about this aspect of their students lives. When it comes to the control Yuzuru has over his skating, when they have disagreed in the recent past Brian has said himself that he has on occasion been less clear sighted than Yuzuru about the direction they should take, over the 4loop for example. I can imagine that Brian feels a bit put out about the mess at GPF but the professional response in my view would be to take his own advice and not look at social media, and not rise to the bait in interviews. Given all the media pressure he has it seems very understandable to me that Yuzuru should give himself a barrier against all that, a buffer from all the expectation and criticism. That said, TCC has worked well for him and I’m very glad he decided to go there - the group coaching situation seems to work really well. I imagine they all have different things to offer each skater, and encouraging them to take responsibility for their own careers is good.

Thank you for translating- always grateful for this - the horror of google translate......

Not a circus- a farce, of the broadest, least subtle, kind. ISU don’t have a clue and they’re allowing a Russian ‘entrepreneur ‘ to hijack the whole thing. And if it’s a disaster there’s a handy pandemic on which to cast the blame if spectators are few.

His interview sounded upbeat - I really hope the operation has solved the problem for good and that he’ll be back full force next season.

I will die if he does use Phantom - he’s never messed around with sequences from it at practices and galas the way he has with PW and LGC - I think it’s indelibly imprinted with that difficult 14/15 season in his mind. I’d be thrilled to be wrong as it was my first season watching him, and is a favourite of mine despite the music, which was once my musical bete noir, until the figure skating world gave me Moulin Rouge to loathe with every fibre of my being.

The Union Jack was and is used by the far right in the UK - that and the tourist industry. It can make one uncomfortable, especially if one is half Irish/Scots/Welsh with all the problems of the union. I feel it, to the extent that when I was car hunting I didn’t consider for long the best value car in the first batch I saw which was a very nice mini at an excellent price but unfortunately plastered with the flag. I don’t have a problem with it in it’s correct place and I think as long as the Olympics etc use nationality as a way of badging competitors athletics is one of those correct places. I think Yuzuru gets it about right. I felt extremely sorry for Gabby Douglas when US social media gave her hell for not (in their view ) adequately saluting the flag on the women’s gymnastics team podium - I don’t imagine Japanese media would be any nicer to Yuzuru if they decided to draw the same conclusion about him.

PotO ..........

Given that knowing the way his fans freak out over everything surely adds enormously to the pressure he’s under and that he seems to lurk, open expressions of extreme worry and upset over interviews is probably not helpful. Can we just accept that he was exhausted from all that travelling and put most of that interview down to that? Support is the thing, not piling extra baggage on to what’s already there. .

I’m listening to Satie’s Gnosiennes atm and thinking if he wanted to stick with piano music the melancholy weirdness of these might suit him well

Oh I know that- but from the American point of view an ice princess is a much more attractive and an easier sell than a man or a pair or an ice dance team. I don’t think Rusfed cares particularly about that - they welcome being on top in any discipline and I don’t think they discriminate between them. USFSA prefers women, always has, and it wants good looking, graceful, princess types because historically that is what its public has responded to. Whether that is still what they might respond to I’ve no idea but we know how slowly the powers that be adjust to change.